


The Key

by Jenshih_Blue



Category: Sleepy Hollow (TV)
Genre: Episode Related, Gen, Season/Series 01, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-15
Updated: 2013-10-15
Packaged: 2017-12-29 12:48:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1005649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jenshih_Blue/pseuds/Jenshih_Blue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After her conversation with Abbie, Jenny considers the first step toward something she never believed she’d willingly offer. In doing so, she converses with both a ghost and her sister’s mysterious companion, Ichabod Crane.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Key

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at writing a Sleepy Hollow fic so for the love of the Goddess be gentle. *chuckles*

Forgiveness seemed such a simple concept, but despite the simplicity of its exterior beneath it was a roaring vortex of emotional fire. It reminded Jenny of the door the Hessians had almost succeeded in opening hours ago in the abandoned church outside Sleepy Hollow. Twisted and burning, the stench of sulfuric gases from the scorching sands of Hell, and demons struggling to rise above an endless sea of viscera.

 

She sat silent and alone in the interrogation room, morning light streaming through the barred windows, light reflecting off motes of dust and giving the shadowy room a surreal feel. Her thoughts were much like those dust motes lost in the darkness of hatred she’d held tight in her heart for so many years against the sister who’d betrayed and left her to walk the sands of insanity alone. She clung to her hatred the single thing that had kept her adrift for all those years, but now…

 

Eyes closing, she inhaled sharp through her nose, fingers playing out a mindless tune against the scarred wood of the table, hands on either side of the sheave of creased papers. Beyond the room, she could hear the fading retreat of Abbie’s boot heels on the hard floor, a faint echo of voices, and the bang of a door. Corbin had wanted her to forgive her last remaining family, yet he hadn’t pushed her about it. The man who’d saved her understood what it meant to dig deep into your soul and discover the strength to do something as profound as forgive another human being. The source of her hatred was far from divine and as if her hatred taunted her there was a divinity to forgiveness she couldn’t quite embrace yet.

 

The sound of the door opening caused her to open her eyes and what she saw tore the air from her lungs. Corbin stood in front of her looking as he had the last time she’d seen him…The night before his death at the hands of the Horseman. She’d seen a great deal in her short life, but seeing Corbin again was not one of those things she’d expected.

 

“Jenny.”

 

His voice was a roll of thunder, deep and forbidding to some, but to her it sounded of comfort and spoke of home. The corner of his mouth tipped in the way he’d always had not quite a smile and not quite a smirk, but it made her heart ache as nothing else could.

 

“Corbin.” Her voice cracked despite her best efforts.

 

He took a step forward and leaned in large calloused hands pressed against the same wood she’d been tapping seconds before. One of his eyebrows lifted, eyes sparkling. “Told you she’d find you eventually, girl.”

 

She swallowed hard, tears eradicating the vision even as she struggled to keep them at bay. “That you did, Corbin.”

 

Neither of them moved eyes locked across the table. Jenny had trusted no one after her sister turned away from her until August Corbin picked her up that night. He hadn’t dragged her back to the station, but rather had drove to the local diner she later learned was his favorite watering hole, so to speak…Apple pie a la mode and a cup of hot black coffee.

 

“Jenny, you understand now what’s at stake, don’t you?”

 

She glanced down at the papers in front of her and wondered if the words Abbie had spoken were the truth or simply another lie. Reaching out she fingered the edge of the paper the words wavering in and out of focus. She wanted to believe they were the truth. There remained inside her a part of the young girl who had once existed clinging to the hope her sister would return, and if she were honest that young girl had always been there hiding in the dark corners of her troubled mind.

 

“Believe in her, Jenny. Is that so much to ask?”

 

Head jerking up she gasped as the paper sliced open the edge of her finger. This time it wasn’t Corbin, but rather her sister’s odd companion, Ichabod Crane. He was standing in the open doorway a curious expression on his angular face, intense blue eyes burning through her as if they were twin flames.

 

“You’re asking a great deal.” She spit out as she lifted her injured finger to her lips. “You have no idea what it feels like to be completely abandoned and lost.”

 

Ichabod quirked an eyebrow, lips curling in an amused smirk, “Are you so sure of that?”

 

No, she wasn’t sure of that or anything else to be honest. The one man she had trusted, the man who’d been her mentor, father, and best friend lay buried six feet beneath the earth and yet she’d spoken to him seconds before. Corbin had prepared her as best he could, educated her in the ways of war, and sent her the furthest reaches of the globe to bring back things she’d never imagined existed. She’d ask questions, but what few answers he’d had only raised more questions in her inquisitive mind.

 

“Maybe you do understand.”

 

He crossed the room and sat in the chair across from her, hands folded on the table and ducked his head trying to capture her elusive gaze. “It is quite clear your Sheriff Corbin understood more than your sister and I believed at first. He saved both you and Abbie for different reasons although I imagine those reasons will eventually connect as did she and I.”

 

Jenny contemplated Ichabod’s words. She was saved in more than one way by August Corbin and despite her sister’s belief that she’d been secure in that damnable facility she hadn’t. More than once, she’d slipped out at night often ending up on the road where the search parties discovered them all those years ago. Standing at the edge of the woods in the fog-shrouded darkness, she would close her eyes, memories of a long ago terrifying afternoon rising to the surface. Despite numerous trips, she had never managed to enter those woods again.

 

“Are you really from the past?” she asked although she already knew the truth in her gut.

 

He smiled, self-deprecating humor in his eyes. “Past, present, future what does it matter considering this dire situation we discover ourselves entangled in?”

 

“True.” She returned his smile as she lifted her head to meet his understanding gaze beneath a tangle of wild hair. “It never crossed my mind Abbie would accept the truth. She was always the good one you know. The one who worked hard in school, the one who swore our upbringing would never define her. I think sometimes if it hadn’t been for me we would have never been in the woods that afternoon.”

 

“It matters not.” Ichabod replied. “This demon would have found you whether there or not.”

 

Arms crossing over her chest, Jenny leaned back in the chair, balanced on two legs. “You said you had seen it.”

 

“I have.”

 

“The trees, bleached bone white?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Its name is Moloch.”

 

Ichabod nodded.

 

“You understand although it’s now considered a demon, it once was worshipped as a god.”

 

He frowned. “How do you know that?”

 

“Corbin once sent me to the Middle East to meet with a contact. I was there to collect a package.” She paused attention drawn to the bloody cut on her finger. “Most trips I did for him I never asked about, but this one I did.”

 

“What did he tell you?”

 

Jenny snorted. “Corbin wasn’t one to share information unless he believed you were ready for the answer.”

 

“So, he revealed nothing.”

 

“All he said was the package contained a rare item worth more than I could imagine.” She glanced up at Ichabod. “If you know the demons’ name then you know why its worshippers were obliterated over time.”

 

“I do.”

 

“Worship of it spread through numerous cultures as far as North Africa and Carthage, even the Jewish Rabbinical community spoke of it in whispers. Moloch desired sacrifices and its worshippers gave their children to it, burning them alive according to certain writings and to others passing them through flames to let it have them as its own.”

 

Ichabod stood, face pale in the harsh morning light. “You opened the package.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“What did you find?”

 

“It was a key unlike any I’ve ever seen before or since.”

 

“What did the key open, Jenny?”

 

She shook her head. “I never had a chance to find out. I lost the package outside of Chicago to the Hessians although at the time I didn’t know who they were.”

 

“How may I ask did you survive?”

 

The corner of her mouth curved in a faint smile, “Dumb luck to be honest. I’d gone downstairs to the bar to have a drink. When I returned to my room, it had been ransacked and the package was gone so I high-tailed it out of Chicago.”

 

“What did Corbin say when you returned?”

 

“Nothing.” she sighed. “He was disappointed, but it seemed he had been expecting as much.”

 

Ichabod began pacing the floor, heels of his riding boots echoing through the near empty room. She watched him eyes narrowed and wondered what was going through his mind. There was something about this man, an enticement, she’d never experienced when it came to another human being. Corbin had been a mystery, but Crane was something far more than a simple mystery. He seemed to understand her on a visceral level, dig beneath her skin with a single word or glance.

 

He came to a sudden stop and glanced at her, expression unreadable. “Find it in your heart to forgive her, Jenny. Perhaps, it is the key we require for success in stopping what is to come. After all we must trust one another…Am I not correct?”

 

With that, he walked out the door leaving her alone with her thoughts. She sat for what seemed an eternity staring at the empty door, sounds of the police station muffled in the distance. There was a part of her trapped deep inside that wished everything were different and yet…

 

Her gaze lowered to the papers Abbie had left behind. All it took was a signature to begin the process, but she was still unsure whether to step forward. It was easy for some to forgive. For others, it was a wasteland where they needed to fight every shadow. Her heart ached for all the years lost between her and Abbie. Once upon a time, she’d loved her sister. Perhaps, she still did…Who knew? But she was no longer the young girl she’d once been.

 

Standing she reached out and folded the papers, stuffing them back in the envelope from which they’d come. There was no time to waste on this decision, she understood that, yet she was unwilling to make a decision without thought. If her sister believed it was this easy to earn her forgiveness, she was mistaken. Corbin had wanted them together, but he’d never expected it to come easy. This was only the first step toward their ultimate destination. There were miles to go before either of them slept in peace again for the seas of forgiveness were a treacherous bitch to navigate.

 

~Finis~


End file.
